What would you do if you got a message one day from someone you didn't know, who had read your blog and as a result was asking you to help them escape from being murdered in Iraq? That's what happened to Dan Hardie, organiser of the We Can't Leave Them Behind online campaign for local employees of British forces in Iraq.

As a result of that campaign, and the of the British government's offer of limited asylum and resettlement packages, Dan's blog is one of the highest-ranked google searches for Iraqi employees looking for information. As a result of inquiries coming through his blog, Dan has now been put in touch with a number of people who are stuck in Iraq and who seem to be falling foul of technicalities in the UK resettlement offer.

All sorts of pitfalls await if you are an Iraqi in need of resettlement aid, apparently. David Miliband's statement announced that the British government would not offer any assistance to anybody who worked for the British before January 1 2005; including, say, any Iraqi who risked his or her life supporting the Princess of Wales Regiment in May and June 2004, when the Mahdi Army attacked and killed British soldiers and Private Johnson Beharry won the Victoria Cross. Similarly excluded are any Iraqis who worked for less than 12 months for the British, although it's common knowledge among soldiers that many employees worked the length of one battalion's six-month tour and then were told to go and work for other employers.

There is also a particularly nasty catch-22 at work, in that it is not possible to apply for asylum until you have left Iraq. This is very difficult to do at present, since Syria and Jordan have effectively closed their borders and are trying to get rid of the Iraqi refugees they have already got. This of course leaves many ex-employees stuck in Basra, trying to dodge the death squads. Even the employees who have managed to reach Syria or Jordan are finding that the British Embassy is dealing with them with something less than the appropriate sense of urgency; all applicants are being told that they must wait at least 30 days and at least one man has been told to resubmit his application "as we have a new form," with his visa running out of time.

The details are set out on Dan's own site. They all describe people who have worked for the British Army or for their contractors, who have been made targets of death squads as a result, but who are basically being abandoned to their fate. This is completely wrong.

Letters and emails to the government do work. The last campaign resulted in a significant change of policy, which did make resettlement packages available to a significant proportion of local employees. But the policy isn't generous enough and hasn't been implemented in a particularly competent or compassionate way. If the pressure can be kept on, then that too will change.

Writing to your MP is considerably easier than it was the last time we put together a mailshot for this campaign, as parliament is currently in session, so mail sent to your MP's Westminster office will be received on a timely basis. The address is:

House of CommonsWestminsterLondonSW1A 0AA

Failing that, WriteToThem.com can send emails, or you can directly email (most MPs have House of Commons email addresses of the form surnameinitial@parliament.uk (eg browng@parliament.uk). Obviously, it is important to be polite and sensible, but there is no point in pussyfooting around on the matter; the people concerned are at risk every minute of every day.